How to Set Up an EC2 Instance as a Web Server

Introduction

Amazon EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) allows you to run virtual machines in the cloud. In this article, we will launch an EC2 instance and set it up as a web server using Apache or Nginx. By the end, you will have a running web server that can serve web pages.

Step 1. Launch an EC2 Instance.

• Log in to the AWS Console
  • Go to AWS Management Console and navigate to EC2.
  • Click on "Launch Instance".
• Choose an Amazon Machine Image (AMI)
  • Select Amazon Linux or Ubuntu. These are commonly used for web servers.
• Choose an Instance Type
  • For free-tier users, select t2.micro (1 vCPU, 1 GB RAM).
• Configure Security Group
  • Allow SSH (port 22): To connect via the terminal.
  • Allow HTTP (port 80): To access the web server.
• Launch the Instance
  • Click "Launch", create or select an existing key pair, and download it.

Step 2. Connect to the EC2 Instance.

• Open a terminal (Linux/Mac) or PuTTY (Windows).
• Run the SSH command.

  ssh -i "C:\Users\ATUL GUPTA\Downloads\rocky-999.pem" [email protected]

Step 3. Install a Web Server Apache2.

• Update package lists.

  sudo apt update -y

• Install Apache2.

  sudo apt install -y apache2

• Start Apache service.

  sudo systemctl start apache2

• Enable Apache to start on boot.

  sudo systemctl enable apache2

• Check the service status.

  sudo systemctl status apache2

• If Apache is running, you should see "active (running)" in green.

Step 4. Test Your Web Server.

• Copy the Public IP of your EC2 instance from the AWS EC2 dashboard.
• Open a web browser and visit.

  http://your-ec2-public-ip

• You should see the Apache/Nginx default page.
  

Step 5. Customize Your Web Page.

Since you are seeing the default Apache2 page, you can now replace it with your own custom webpage.

Navigate to the Web Root Directory

Run the following command in your terminal.

cd /var/www/html

Create a Simple HTML Page

Run this command to replace the default page with a new one.

echo '<h1>Welcome to My EC2 Web Server!</h1>' | sudo tee index.html

Refresh the Browser

Go back to http://your-ec2-public-ip in your web browser.

You should now see

"Welcome to My EC2 Web Server!" instead of the default Apache page.

Conclusion

In this article, we successfully set up an Amazon EC2 instance as a web server using Apache2. By launching the EC2 instance, configuring the necessary security groups, installing Apache, and customizing the default web page, you now have a fully functional web server. You can use this setup to host static websites or further configure it for dynamic web applications.